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Fast-food workers across the country protested their low pay this week, while President Obama decried the nation's growing wealth gap, calling it "the defining challenge of our time." Meanwhile, the nation's capital city passed a new minimum wage law.

The esteemed UK songwriter says the idea of making a holiday record seemed laughable at first. He tells NPR's Arun Rath how he came around, and performs a few songs from the new Quality Street: A Seasonal Selection for All the Family.

Since 2001, more than 100,000 troops have left the military with an other-than-honorable discharge. The "bad paper" puts benefits and medical care out of reach, even for those who served in combat. Which raises a simple question: What does America owe those who serve?

While the latest Coen brothers movie, Inside Llewyn Davis, isn't a biopic, it is inspired by the life of a real person: the late Dave Van Ronk. He was a folk and blues singer and a central figure in the folk revival of the early 1960s. NPR's Joel Rose has the story of the musician, who was known for his avuncular presence on the Greenwich Village scene.

Winter won't officially begin until nearly two more weeks pass, but snow, ice, and freezing rain are blanketing a large swath of the U.S. As of Monday morning, more than a thousand flights were cancelled.

During the Cold War, successive U.S. leaders supported the white South African government because it staunchly opposed communism. Mandela's African National Congress, meanwhile, had many ties to the Soviet Union and viewed it as more sympathetic to their cause than the U.S. and other Western countries.

Children's voices, slashing grain, making tea and a call to prayer — all sounds of an American living in Senegal.

Yingluck Shinawatra's move comes as she tries to defuse anti-government protests that began last month. But protest leaders said they will rest only when Thai politics is rid of her family's influence.

Taken together, retired baseball managers Joe Torre, Tony La Russa and Bobby Cox won eight World Series titles and 7,558 games. Their names appeared on all of the voters' ballots Sunday.

A new study suggests that while most people want jobs that pay more, most of the jobs currently available are low wage. Guest host Celeste Headlee speaks with Ben Henry of the Alliance for a Just Society and Steven Greenhouse of The New York Times.